


Old Fashioned

by littlewonder



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Book 3: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Canon Era, Dialogue, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-13
Packaged: 2020-06-27 09:11:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19787791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlewonder/pseuds/littlewonder
Summary: Snape pays a visit to Lupin. All does not go according to plan.





	Old Fashioned

**Author's Note:**

> originally posted to [LJ](https://littlewonder2.livejournal.com/12134.html)

Severus Snape could hear the music from here. He was surprised he hadn't heard the music before he opened the door to Lupin's classroom, but he assumed that must be the heavy front door. Still, he thought that music that loud would seep through just the same. Never mind.

With renewed vigour, he stalked up the front of the classroom and up the stairs to his office. As the music grew louder, beating into his eardrums, Snape became all the more angrier. He hated jazz music.

He lingered in the doorway, glaring first at the phonograph, then at Lupin, who seemed to be refusing to look at him. He just sat there non-chalantly, moving his body joyously to the music, clicking his fingers to the beat, and looking down at the student's work he was correcting. Even if the music was loud, though, that surely couldn't hide the fact that Snape was standing right there, glaring down at the man he hated as much as the music and willing the man to look at him.

But Lupin would not look at him, was too good at ignoring him, so finally he shouted over the music, "Turn that bloody racket off!"

Lupin's head shot up. "Severus!" he said in surprise. Oh, this man was good.

"Turn it off right now!" Snape shouted, and Lupin waved his wand at it, withdrawing the needle.

Suddenly, it was eerily silent, and for a moment, they both just stared at each other. Snape did not know why he didn't just say what he'd come to say, but in that silence, all he could do was stare into those deep, age-ridden brown eyes while Lupin looked into his black ones. After a while, it was Lupin who broke the silence. 

"What is it, Severus?"

For a moment, he did not speak. His eyes shifted to the phonograph for a moment, and changing the subject before it began, he said, "You're too old-fashioned."

"I _am_ old, Severus," he replied.

"I am as old as you are, Lupin, but you don't see me carrying around a phonograph."

"I like my phonograph. It's classical."

"You weren't born in the 1930s," snapped Snape. "You were born in the sixties, same as me. Why don't you act your own age?"

"Why do you keep comparing us like that?" asked Lupin. "Putting us in the same group? I thought you didn't want to be like me? Isn't that what you always told me?"

"I am not like you," retorted Snape. "My refusal to part with that reality proves nothing."

"It proves everything. You always denied any connection to me whatsoever. Even obvious things like that. But now..."

"I was an immature teenager! Surely you can relate?"

"Indeed..." replied Lupin, and his eyes drifted back to the phonograph. "In life," he continued, staring blankly at it now, "you either change as you grow, or you never change at all. I never changed..." his eyes drifted back to Snape, focusing again, "but you did. Do you have any idea what that means?"

Snape glared down at Lupin again. "If you're suggesting --"

"...that you'll change for me? You could. I'm not saying you would."

"But you wish so."

Lupin nodded. Then his eyes refocused on Snape. "You didn't come here to talk of my phonograph. Or anything else we've just discussed. What do you want, Severus?"

Snape looked at Lupin colder than before, knowing he'd let things get away from him. "Happy birthday," he said in the most subtly sarcastic way he could manage, and turned to leave. He didn't give Lupin another chance, and was soon gone.


End file.
